Desktops are platforms that may be used to launch other applications. In remote desktop environments, the desktop platform is provided at a remote location as compared to the client machine that is viewing the desktop. In this context, the remote desktop platform may be considered an application launch endpoint as the client connects to this endpoint in order to obtain the application launch capabilities provided by the desktop platform.
An example of an application launch endpoint is a virtual machine. A virtual machine runs the desktop logic remotely, but provides rendering instructions to the local client machine. The user may interact with the client machine to launch applications that will run in the context of the virtual machine. Another example of an application launch endpoint is a session managed by session management servers (also called a terminal server).
Conventionally, application launch endpoints are deployed in the “private cloud” meaning that the data center that supports the application launch endpoint is managed and maintained within an enterprise corresponding to the users the endpoints serve. More recently, application launch endpoints have been deployed in the “public cloud” in data centers that support multiple tenants, and that may perhaps be remotely located from the tenants that the data center(s) support.